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SELECTED POEMS 

LONGFELLOW, 

MACAULAY, LOWELL, 

BROWNING, BYRON, 

SHELLEY 

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Wfyt iKitarsfae ^Literature petite 



SELECTED POEMS 

LONGFELLOW, MACAULAY, LOWELL, 
BROWNING, BYRON, SHELLEY 

WITH INTRODUCTIONS AND NOTES 



Prescribed by the Regents of the University 
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CONTENTS 



OCT. 2^ I9U5 
?.opyri£nx 

i 

PAGE 

The Skeleton in Armor. Longfellow . 1 

Horatius. Macaulay 8 

The Singing Leaves. Lowell 33 

Rhcecus. Lowell 38 

Washington — from Under the Old Elm. Lowell ... 44 

Selection from Under the Willows. Lowell 50 

Incident of the French Camp. Browning 54 

Apostrophe to the Ocean. Byron 56 

To A Skylark. Shelley ,*.*.«. 60 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

Portra.it of Longfellow ....*.. Frontispiece 

Horatius at the Bridge . . * 9 

Portrait of Lowell 33 

Portrait of Washington 45 



COPYRIGHT 1869 BY JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 
COPYRIGHT 1897 BY MABEL LOWELL BURNETT 
COPYRIGHT 1905 BY HOUGHTON MIFFLIN & CO. 

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 



SELECTED POEMS 

THE SKELETON IN ARMOR 1 

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW 



u 



Speak ! speak ! thou fearful guest ! 
Who, with thy hollow breast 
Still in rude armor drest, 

Comest to daunt me ! 
Wrapt not in Eastern balms, 2 5 

But with thy fleshless palms 
Stretched, as if asking alms, 

Why dost thou haunt me?" 

Then, from those cavernous eyes 
Pale flashes seemed to rise, 10 

As when the Northern skies 
Gleam in December ; 

1 " This ballad was suggested to me," says Mr. Longfellow, 
" while riding on the seashore at Newport. A year or two pre- 
vious a skeleton had been dug up at Fall River, clad in broken 
and corroded armor ; and the idea occurred to me of connecting 
it with the Round Tower at Newport, generally known hitherto 
as the Old Windmill, though now claimed by the Danes as a 
work of their early ancestors." It is generally conceded now 
that the Norsemen had nothing to do with the old mill at New- 
port, which is a close copy of one standing at Chesterton, in 
Warwickshire, England. The destruction of the armor shortly 
after it was found has prevented any trustworthy examination of 
it, to see if it was really Scandinavian or only Indian. The poet 
sings as one haunted by the skeleton, and able to call out its 
voice. 

2 This old warrior was not embalmed as an Egyptian mummy. 



HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW 

And, like the water's flow 
Under December's snow, 
Came a dull voice of woe 15 

From the heart's chamber. 



<t 



u 



I was a Viking 1 old ! 

My deeds, though manifold, 

No Skald 2 in song has told, 

No Saga 3 taught thee ! 20 

Take heed, that in thy verse 
Thou dost the tale rehearse, 
Else dread a dead man's curse ; 

For this I sought thee. 

Far in the Northern Land, 25 

By the wild Baltic's strand, 
I, with my childish hand, 

Tamed the gerfalcon ; 
And, with my skates fast-bound, 
Skimmed the half-frozen Sound, 30 

That the poor whimpering hound 

Trembled to walk on. 



" Oft to his frozen lair 
Tracked I the grisly bear, 
While from my path the hare 35 

1 The Vik-ings took their name from an old Norse word, vik, 
still used in Norway, signifying creek, because the sea-pirates 
made their haunts among the indentations of the coast, and 
sallied out thence in search of booty. 

2 The Skald was the Norse chronicler and poet who sang of 
brave deeds at the feasts of the warriors. 

3 The Saga was the saying or chronicle of the heroic deeds. 
There are many of these old sagas still preserved in Northern 
literature. 



THE SKELETON IN ARMOR 3 

Fled like a shadow ; 
Oft through the forest dark 
Followed the were-wolf 's ' bark, 
Until the soaring lark 

Sang from the meadow. 40 

44 But when I older grew, 
Joining a corsair's crew, 
O'er the dark sea I flew 

With the marauders. 
Wild was the life we led ; 45 

Many the souls that sped, 
Many the hearts that bled, 
By our stern orders. 

" Many a wassail-bout 
Wore the long winter out ; 50 

Often our midnight shout 

Set the cocks crowing, 
As we the Berserk's 2 tale 
Measured in cups of ale, 
Draining the oaken pail, 55 

Filled to o'erflowing. 

" Once as I told in glee 
Tales of the stormy sea, 

1 In the fables of Northern Europe there were said to be men 
who could change themselves into wolves at pleasure, and they 
were called were-wolves. 

2 There was a famous warrior in the fabulous history of Nor- 
way who went into battle bare of armor (ber — bare ; scerke — a 
shirt of mail), but possessed of a terrible rage ; he had twelve 
sons like himself, who were also called Berserks or Berserkers, 
and the phrase Berserker rage has come into use to express a 
terrible fury which makes a man fearless and strong. 



HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW 

Soft eyes did gaze on me, 

Burning, yet tender ; 60 

And as the white stars shine 
On the dark Norway pine, 
On that dark heart of mine 

Fell their soft splendor. 

" I wooed the blue-eyed maid, 65 

Yielding, yet half afraid, 
And in the forest's shade 

Our vows were plighted. 
Under its loosened vest 
Fluttered her little breast, 70 

Like birds within their nest 

By the hawk frighted. 

" Bright in her father's hall 
Shields gleamed upon the wall, 
Loud sang the minstrels all, 75 

Chanting his glory ; 
When of old Hildebrand 
I asked his daughter's hand, 
Mute did the minstrels stand 

To hear my story. 80 

" While the brown ale he quaffed, 
Loud then the champion laughed, 
And as the wind-gusts waft 

The sea-foam brightly, 
So the loud laugh of scorn, 85 

Out of those lips unshorn, 
From the deep drinking-horn 

Blew the foam lightly. 



THE SKELETON IN ARMOR 5 

" She was a Prince's child, 
I but a Viking wild, 90 

And though she blushed and smiled, 

I was discarded ! 
Should not the dove so white 
Follow the sea-mew's flight, 
Why did they leave that night 95 

Her nest unguarded ? 

" Scarce had I put to sea, 
Bearing the maid with me, 
Fairest of all was she 

Among the Norsemen ! 100 

When on the white sea-strand, 
Waving his armed hand, 
Saw we old Hildebrand, 

With twenty horsemen. 

" Then launched they to the blast, 105 

Bent like a reed each mast, 
Yet we were gaining fast, 

When the wind failed us ; 
And with a sudden flaw 
Came round the gusty Skaw, 1 110 

So that our foe we saw 
Laugh as he hailed us. 

" And as to catch the gale 
Round veered the flapping sail, 
Death! was the helmsman's hail, 115 

Death without quarter ! 

1 Skaw : a promontory. The Icelandic word was skagi : cf . 
Skager-Rack. 



HENRY WADS WORTH LONGFELLOW 

Mid-ships with iron keel 
Struck we her ribs of steel ; 
Down her black hulk did reel 

Through the black water ! 120 

" As with his wings aslant, 
Sails the fierce cormorant, 
Seeking some rocky haunt, 

With his prey laden ; 
So toward the open main, 125 

Beating to sea again, 
Through the wild hurricane, 

Bore I the maiden. 

" Three weeks we westward bore, 
And when the storm was o'er, 130 

Cloud-like we saw the shore 

Stretching to leeward ; 
There for my lady's bower 
Built I the lofty tower, 
Which, to this very hour, 135 

Stands looking seaward. 

" There lived we many years ; 
Time dried the maiden's tears ; 
She had forgot her fears, 

She was a mother ; 140 

Death closed her mild blue eyes, 
Under that tower she lies ; 
Ne'er shall the sun arise 

On such another ! 

" Still grew my bosom then, 145 

£sfill cis n. G+Qocnanf. -Fori ! 



btill grew my bosom tn 
Still as a stagnant fen ! 



THE SKELETON IN ARMOR 7 

Hateful to me were men, 
The sunlight hateful ! 
In that vast forest here, 
Clad in my warlike gear, 150 

Fell I upon my spear, 
0, death was grateful ! 



u 



Thus, seamed with many scars, 

Bursting these prison bars, 

Up to its native stars 155 

My soul ascended ! 
There from the flowing bowl 
Deep drinks the warrior's soul, 
Skoal I x to the Northland ! skoal I " 

Thus the tale ended. 160 

1 " In Scandinavia," says Mr. Longfellow, " this is the cus- 
tomary salutation when drinking a health. I have slightly 
changed the orthography of the word [skal] in order to preserve 
the correct pronunciation." 



HORATIUS 1 

A LAY MADE ABOUT THE YEAR OF THE CITY CCCLX 

LORD MACAULAY 

1 

Lars Porsena 2 of Clusium 
By the Nine Gods 3 he swore 

1 There can be little doubt that among those parts of early 
Roman history which had a poetical origin was the legend of 
Horatius Codes. We have several versions of the story, and 
these versions differ from each other in points of no small im- 
portance. It is remarkable that, according to Polybius, Horatius 
defended the bridge alone, and perished in the waters. Accord- 
ing to the chronicles which Livy and Dionysius followed, Hora- 
tius had two companions, swam safe to shore, and was loaded 
with honors and rewards. 

It is by no means unlikely that there were two old Roman 
lays about the defense of the bridge ; and that, while the story 
which Livy has transmitted to us was preferred by the multi- 
tude, the other, which ascribed the whole glory to Horatius 
alone, may have been the favorite with the Horatian house. 

The legendary history makes an Etruscan dynasty of three 
kings, Tarquinius Priscus, Servius Tullius, and Tarquinius Super- 
bus, to have ruled Rome successively; but the tyranny of the 
house became so hateful that the Tarquinian family was ban- 
ished, and a republic, governed by two magistrates called con- 
suls, chosen annually, was set up 509 B. c, or in the year 244 
from the foundation of Rome. Tarquin attempted, first by in- 
trigue, then by open war, to recover his throne ; it was then that 
he sought the alliance of Porsena, who ruled over Etruria, and 
the ballad that follows narrates the exploit of Horatius when the 
city was being defended. 

2 Lars in the Etruscan tongue signifies chieftain, Clusium is 
the modern Chiusi. 

8 The Romans had a tradition that there were nine great 
Etruscan gods. 




From drawing by George Scharf, Jr., in " Lays of Ancient Rome," by permission of the 
publishers, Messrs. Longmans, Green & Co. 



HORATIUS 9 

That the great house of Tarquin 
Should suffer wrong no more. 

By the Nine Gods he swore it, 5 

And named a trysting day, 

And bade his messengers ride forth 

East and west and south and north, 
To summon his array. 

2 

East and west and south and north 10 

The messengers ride fast, 
And tower and town and cottage 

Have heard the trumpet's blast. 
Shame on the false Etruscan 

Who lingers in his home, 15 

When Porsena of Clusium 

Is on the march for Rome. 

3 

The horsemen and the footmen 

Are pouring in amain 
From many a stately market-place ; 20 

From many a fruitful plain ; 
From many a lonely hamlet, 

Which, hid by beech and pine, 
Like an eagle's nest, hangs on the crest 

Of purple Apennine ; 25 

4 

From lordly Volaterrae, 1 

Where scowls the far-famed hold 2 

1 Volaterrce, modern Volterra. 

2 "The situation of the Etruscan towns is one of the most 
striking characteristics of Tuscan scenery. Many of them occupy 



10 LORD MACAU LAY 

Piled by the hands of giants 

For godlike kings of old; 
From seagirt Populonia, 30 

Whose sentinels descry 
Sardinia's snowy mountain-tops 

Fringing the southern sky ; 



From the proud mart of Pisae, 1 

Queen of the western waves, 35 

Where ride Massilia's 2 triremes 

Heavy with fair-haired slaves ; 3 
From where sweet Clanis 4 wanders 

Through corn and vines and flowers ; 
From where Cortona lifts to heaven 40 

Her diadem of towers. 



6 

Tall are the oaks whose acorns 

Drop in dark Auser's 5 rill ; 
Fat are the stags that champ the boughs 

Of the Ciminian hill ; 45 

surfaces of table-land surrounded by a series of gullies not visi- 
ble from a distance. The traveller thus may be a whole day 
reaching a place which in the morning may have seemed to him 
but a little way off." — Dennis, Cities and Cemeteries of Etru- 
ria. 

1 Pisce, now Pisa. 

3 Massilia, now Marseilles, which originally was a Greek colony 
and a great commercial centre. 

8 The fair-haired slaves were doubtless slaves from Gaul, 
bought and sold by the Greek merchants. 

4 Clanis, the modern la Chicana. 

6 The Auser was a tributary stream of the river Arno. 



HORATIUS 11 

Beyond all streams Clitumnus l 

Is to the herdsman dear ; 
Best of all pools the fowler loves 

The great Volsinian mere. 2 

7 
But now no stroke of woodman 50 

Is heard by Auser's rill ; 
No hunter tracks the stag's green path 

Up the Ciminian hill ; 
Unwatched along Clitumnus 

Grazes the milk-white steer ; 55 

Unharmed the waterfowl may dip 

In the Volsinian mere. 

8 
The harvests of Arretium, 3 

This year, old men shall reap, 
This year, young boys in Umbro 4 60 

Shall plunge the struggling sheep ; 
And in the vats of Luna, 

This year, the must shall foam 
Hound the white feet of laughing girls 

Whose sires have marched to Rome. 65 

9 
There be thirty chosen prophets, 5 
The wisest of the land, 

1 Clitumnus, Clituno in modern times. 

2 Volsinian mere, now known as Lago di Bolsena. 
8 Arretium, now Arezzo. 

4 Umbro, the river Ombrone. All this region was occupied 
by the Etruscans, and since the men had gone to fight Rome, 
only the old and very young would be left to carry on the work 
of the country. 

5 The Etruscan religion was one of sorcery, and their prophets 



12 LORD MA CAUL AY 

Who alway by Lars Porsena 
Both morn and evening stand : 

Evening and morn the Thirty 70 

Have turned the verses o'er, 

Traced from the right on linen white * 
By mighty seers of yore. 

10 

And with one voice the Thirty 

Have their glad answer given : 75 

" Go forth, go forth, Lars Porsena ; 

Go forth, beloved of Heaven : 
Go, and return in glory 

To Clusium's royal dome ; 
And hang round Nurscia's altars 80 

The golden shields of Rome." 

11 

And now hath every city 

Sent up her tale of men : 2 
The foot are fourscore thousand, 

The horse are thousands ten* 85 

Before the gates of Sutrium 3 

Is met the great array. 
A proud man was Lars Porsena 

Upon the trysting day. 

were augurs who sought to know the will of the gods by various 
outward signs; such as the flight of birds, the direction of light- 
ning, and the mystic writings of the prophets before them. 

1 The Etruscan writing was from right to left. 

2 Tale of men, cf. Milton's lines in L' Allegro, — 

" And every shepherd tells his tale 
Under the hawthorn, in the dale." 

The tally which we keep is a kindred word. 

8 Sutrium is Sutri to-day. 



HORATIUS 13 

12 

For all the Etruscan armies 90 

Were ranged beneath his eye, 
And many a banished Roman, 

And many a stout ally ; 
And with a mighty following 

To join the muster came 95 

The Tusculan Mamilius, 

Prince of the Latian name. 

13 ' 

But by the yellow Tiber 

Was tumult and affright : 
From all the spacious champaign 100 

To Rome men took their flight. 
A mile around the city, 

The throng stopped up the ways ; 
A fearful sight it was to see 

Through two long nights and days. 105 

14 

For aged folks on crutches, 

And women great with child, 
And mothers sobbing over babes 

That clung to them and smiled, 
And sick men borne in litters 110 

High on the necks of slaves, 
And troops of sunburnt husbandmen 

With reaping-hooks and staves, 

15 

And droves of mules and asses 

Laden with skins of wine, 115 



14 LORD MACAU LAY 

And endless flocks of goats and sheep, 

And endless herds of kine, 
And endless trains of wagons 

That creaked beneath the weight 
Of corn-sacks and of household goods, 120 

Choked every roaring gate. 

16 

Now, from the rock Tarpeian, 1 

Could the wan burghers 2 spy 
The line of blazing villages 

Red in the midnight sky. 125 

The Fathers of the City, 3 

They sat all night and day, 
For every hour some horseman came 

With tidings of dismay. 

17 

To eastward and to westward 130 

Have spread the Tuscan bands ; 
Nor house nor fence nor dovecote 

In Crustumerium stands. 
Verbenna down to Ostia 4 

Hath wasted all the plain ; 135 

Astur hath stormed Janiculum, 5 

And the stout guards are slain. 

1 The Tarpeian rock was a cliff on the steepest side of the 
Capitoline Hill in Rome, and overhung the Tiber. 

2 Burghers, Macaulay uses a very modern word to describe the 
men of Rome. 

8 The Fathers of the City, otherwise the Senators of Rome. 

4 Ostia, at the mouth of the Tiber, was the port of Rome. 

5 The Janiculan hill was on \he right fcank pf £he Tiber. 



HORATIUS 15 

18 

Iwis, 1 in all the Senate, 

There was no heart so bold, 
But sore it ached, and fast it beat, 140 

When that ill news was told. 
Forthwith up rose the Consul, 

Up rose the Fathers all ; 
In haste they girded up their gowns, 

And hied them to the wall. 145 

19 

They held a council standing 

Before the River-Gate ; 
Short time was there, ye well may guess, 

For musing or debate. 
Out spake the Consul roundly : 150 

" The bridge 2 must straight go down ; 
For, since Janiculum is lost, 

Naught else can save the town." 

20 

Just then a scout came flying, 

All wild with haste and fear ; 155 

" To arms ! to arms ! Sir Consul : 

Lars Porsena is here." 
On the low hills to westward 

The Consul fixed his eye, 

1 Iwis t cf . Lowell's lines in Credidimus Jovem regnare : — 

" God vanished long ago, iwis, 
A mere subjective synthesis." 

Its meaning is " certainly." 

2 The bridge was the Sublieian bridge, said to have been 
thrown across the Tiber by Ancus Martius in the year 114 of 
the city. 



16 LORD MACAU LAY 

And saw the swarthy storm of dust 160 

Rise fast along the sky. 

21 

And nearer fast and nearer 

Doth the red whirlwind come ; 
And louder still and still more loud, 
From underneath that rolling cloud, 165 

Is heard the trumpet's war-note proud, 

The trampling, and the hum. 
And plainly and more plainly 

Now through the gloom appears, 
Far to left and far to right, 170 

In broken gleams of dark-blue light, 
The long array of helmets bright, 

The long array of spears. 

22 

And plainly and more plainly 

Above that glimmering line, 175 

Now might ye see the banners 

Of twelve fair cities shine ; l 
But the banner of proud Clusium 

Was highest of them all, 
The terror of the Umbrian, 180 

The terror of the Gaul. 

23 

And plainly and more plainly 

Now might the burghers know, 
By port and vest, 2 by horse and crest, 

1 The Etruscan confederacy was composed of twelve cities. 

2 By port and vest, by the way he carried himself and by his 
dress. Vest, an abbreviation of vesture. 



HORATIUS y 17 

Each warlike Lucumo. 1 185 

There Cilnius of Arretium 

On his fleet roan was seen ; 
And Astur of the fourfold shield, 
Girt with the brand none else may wield, 
Tolumnius with the belt of gold, 190 

And dark Verbenna from the hold 

By reedy Thrasymene. 2 

24 

Fast by the royal standard, 

O'erlooking all the war, 
Lars Porsena of Clusium 195 

Sat in his ivory car. 
By the right wheel rode Mamilius, 3 

Prince of the Latian name ; 
And by the left false Sextus, 4 

That wrought the deed of shame. 200 

25 

But when the face of Sextus 

Was seen among the foes, 
A yell that rent the firmament 

From all the town arose. 
On the house-tops was no woman 205 

But spat towards him and hissed, 

1 Lucumo was the name given by the Latin writers to the 
Etruscan chiefs. 

2 Thrasymene or Trasimenus is Lago di Perugia, and was fa- 
mous in Roman history as the scene of a victory by Hannibal, the 
Carthaginian general, over the Roman forces. 

8 Octavius Mamilius of Tusculum married the daughter of 
Tarquinius. 

4 Sextus, a son of Tarquinius, and the one whose wickedness 
was the immediate cause of the expulsion of the Tarquins. 



18 LORD MACAU LAY 

No child but screamed out curses, 
And shook its little fist. 

26 
But the Consul's brow was sad, 

And the Consul's speech was low, 210 
And darkly looked he at the wall, 
And darkly at the foe. 
" Their van will be upon us 

Before the bridge goes down ; 
And if they once may win the bridge, 215 
What hope to save the town ? " 

27 
Then out spake brave Horatius, 
The Captain of the Gate : 
" To every man upon this earth 

Death cometh soon or late. 220 

And how can man die better 
Than facing fearful odds, 
For the ashes of his fathers, 
And the temples of his Gods, 

28 

" And for the tender mother 225 

Who dandled him to rest, 

And for the wife who nurses 

His baby at her breast, 

And for the holy maidens 1 

Who feed the eternal flame, 230 

1 The Vestal Virgins were bound by vows of celibacy, and 
tended the sacred fire of Vesta. The order survived till near 
the close of the fourth century of our era. For a very interesting 
account of the House of the Vestal Virgins, see Lanciani, An- 
cient Rome in the Light of Recent Discoveries. 



HORATIUS 19 

To save them from false Sextus 
That wrought the deed of shame ? 

29 

" Hew down the bridge, Sir Consul, 

With all the speed ye may; 
I, with two more to help me, 235 

Will hold the foe in play. 
In yon strait path a thousand 

May well be stopped by three. 
Now who will stand on either hand, 

And keep the bridge with me ? " 240 

30 

Then out spake Spurius Lartius ; 
A Ramnian 1 proud was he : 
" Lo, I will stand at thy right hand, 
And keep the bridge with thee." 
And out spake strong Herminius ; 245 

Of Titian 2 blood was he : 
" I will abide on thy left side, 

And keep the bridge with thee." 

31 

" Horatius," quoth the Consul, 

" As thou sayest, so let it be." 250 

And straight against that great array 

Forth went the dauntless Three. 
For Romans in Rome's quarrel 

Spared neither land nor gold, 

1 The Ramnes were one of the three tribes who comprised the 
Roman Patricians, or noble class. 

2 The Tides were another of these three tribes. 



20 LORD MAC A UL AY 

Nor son nor wife, nor limb nor life, 255 

In the brave days of old. 

32 
Then none was for a party ; 

Then all were for the state ; 
Then the great man helped the poor, 

And the poor man loved the great : 260 

Then lands were fairly portioned ; 

Then spoils were fairly sold : 
The Romans were like brothers 

In the brave days of old. 

33 
Now Roman is to Roman 265 

More hateful than a foe, 
And the Tribunes * beard the high, 

And the Fathers grind the low. 
As we wax hot in faction, 

In battle we wax cold : 270 

Wherefore men fight not as they fought 

In the brave days of old. 

34 
Now while the Three were tightening 

Their harness on their backs, 
The Consul was the foremost man 275 

To take in hand an axe : 
And Fathers mixed with Commons 2 

Seized hatchet, bar, and crow, 

1 The Tribunes were officers who represented the tribes of the 
common people or Plebs of Rome. In the time when the ballad 
is supposed to be written, there were two strong parties, the 
Fathers or Patricians (Patres), and the Common People or Plebs. 

2 Commons, Macaulay, an English Whig, used a political 
word very dear to him, as representing the rise of English 
parliamentary government. 



EORATIUS 21 

And smote upon the planks above, 

And loosed the props l below. 280 

35 

Meanwhile the Tuscan army, 

Eight glorious to behold, 
Came flashing back the noonday light, 
Rank behind rank, like surges bright 

Of a broad sea of gold. 285 

Four hundred trumpets sounded 

A peal of warlike glee, 
As that great host, with measured tread, 
And spears advanced, and ensigns spread, 
Rolled slowly towards the bridge's head, 290 

Where stood the dauntless Three. 

36 
The Three stood calm and silent, 

And looked upon the foes, 
And a great shout of laughter 

From all the vanguard rose ; 295 

And forth three chiefs came spurring 

Before that deep array ; 
To earth they sprang, their swords they drew, 
And lifted high their shields, and flew 

To win the narrow way ; 300 

37 
Aunus from green Tifernum, 2 
Lord of the Hill of Vines ; 

1 The props held up the bridge from below. The Latin word 
for props was sublicce; hence the Sublician bridge. Cf. note to 
1. 151. 

2 Tifernum was on the west side of the Apennines, near the 
souree of the Tiber. It is now Citta di Castello. 



22 LORD MACAULAY 

And Seius, whose eight hundred slaves 

Sicken in Ilva's * mines ; 
And Picus, long to Clusium 305 

Vassal in peace and war, 
Who led to fight his Umbrian powers 
From that gray crag where, girt with towers, 
The fortress of Nequinum 2 lowers 

O'er the pale waves of Nar. 310 

38 

Stout Lartius hurled down Aunus 

Into the stream beneath : 
Herminius struck at Seius, 

And clove him to the teeth : 
At Picus brave Horatius 315 

Darted one fiery thrust ; 
And the proud Umbrian's gilded arms 

Clashed in the bloody dust. 

39 

Then Ocnus of Falerii 

Rushed on the Roman Three ; 320 

And Lausulus of Urgo, 

The rover of the sea ; 3 
And Aruns of Volsinium, 

Who slew the great wild boar, 
The great wild boar that had his den 325 

Amidst the reeds of Cosa's fen, 
And wasted fields, and slaughtered men, 

Along Albinia's shore. 

1 Hva is the modern Elba, renowned as the island to which 
Napoleon was banished. 

2 Nequinum, now Narni, on the banks of the Nar. 

3 The Etruscans were pirates as well as merchants. 



HORATIUS 23 

40 

Herminius smote down Aruns : 

Lartius laid Ocnus low : 330 

Right to the heart of Lausulus 

Horatius sent a blow. 
" Lie there," he cried, " fell pirate ! 

No more, aghast and pale, 
From Ostia's walls the crowd shall mark 335 
The track of thy destroying bark. 
No more Campania's hinds shall fly 
To woods and caverns when they spy 

Thy thrice accursed sail." 

41 

But now no sound of laughter 340 

Was heard among the foes. 
A wild and wrathful clamor 

From all the vanguard rose. 
Six spears' lengths from the entrance 

Halted that deep array, 345 

And for a space no man came forth 

To win the narrow way. 

42 

But hark ! the cry is Astur : 

And lo ! the ranks divide ; 
And the great Lord of Luna 350 

Comes with his stately stride. 
Upon his ample shoulders 

Clangs loud the fourfold shield, 
And in his hand he shakes the brand 

Which none but he can wield. 355 



24 LORD MA CAUL AY 

43 

He smiled on those bold Romans 

A smile serene and high ; 
He eyed the flinching Tuscans, 

And scorn was in his eye. 
Quoth he, " The she-wolf's litter 1 360 

Stand savagely at bay : 
But will ye dare to follow, 

If Astur clears the way ? 



>? 



44 

Then, whirling up his broadsword 

With both hands to the height, 365 

He rushed against Horatius, 

And smote with all his might. 
With shield and blade Horatius 

Right deftly turned the blow. 
The blow, though turned, came yet too nigh ; 370 
It missed his helm, but gashed his thigh : 
The Tuscans raised a joyful cry 

To see the red blood flow. 

45 

He reeled, and on Herminius 

He leaned one breathing-space ; 375 

Then, like a wild-cat mad with wounds, 

Sprang right at Astur's face. 
Through teeth, and skull, and helmet, 

So fierce a thrust he sped, 
The good sword stood a handbreadth out 380 

Behind the Tuscan's head. 

1 The she-wolf's littery the Romans. The reference is to the 
story of the suckling of Romulus and Remus by a she-wolf. 



HORATIUS 25 

46 

And the great Lord of Luna 

Fell at that deadly stroke, 
As falls on Mount Alvernus 

A thunder-smitten oak. 385 

Far o'er the crashing forest 

The giant arms lie spread ; 
And the pale augurs, muttering low, 

Gaze on the blasted head. 

/ 47 

On Astur's throat Horatius 390 

Right firmly pressed his heel, 
And thrice and four times tugged amain, 

Ere he wrenched out the steel. 
" And see," he cried, " the welcome, 

Fair guests, that waits you here ! 395 

What noble Lucumo comes next 

To taste our Roman cheer ? " 

48 

But at his haughty challenge 

A sullen murmur ran, 
Mingled of wrath and shame and dread, 400 

Along that glittering van. 
There lacked not men of prowess, 

Nor men of lordly race ; 
For all Etruria's noblest 

Were round the fatal place. 405 

49 

But all Etruria's noblest 
Felt their hearts sink to see 



26 LORD MACAULAY 

On the earth the bloody corpses, 

In the path the dauntless Three : 
And, from the ghastly entrance 410 

Where those bold Romans stood, 
All shrank, like boys who unaware, 
Ranging the woods to start a hare, 
Come to the mouth of the dark lair 
Where, growling low, a fierce old bear 415 
Lies amidst bones and blood. 

50 
Was none who would be foremost 

To lead such dire attack : 
But those behind cried " Forward ! " 

And those before cried " Back ! " 420 

And backward now and forward 

Wavers the deep array ; 
And on the tossing sea of steel, 
To and fro the standards reel ; 
And the victorious trumpet-peal 425 

Dies fitfully away. 

51 

Yet one man for one moment 

Stood out before the crowd ; 
Well known was he to all the Three, 

And they gave him greeting loud, 430 

" Now welcome, welcome, Sextus ! 

Now welcome to thy home ! 
Why dost thou stay, and turn away? 

Here lies the road to Rome." 

52 
Thrice looked he at the city ; 435 

Thrice looked he at the dead ; 



HORATIUS 27 

And thrice came on in fury, 

And thrice turned back in dread ; 

And, white with fear and hatred, 

Scowled at the narrow way 440 

Where, wallowing in a pool of blood, 
The bravest Tuscans lay. 

53 

But meanwhile axe and lever 
Have manfully been plied ; 
And now the bridge hangs tottering 445 

Above the boiling tide. 
" Come back, come back, Horatius ! " 

Loud cried the Fathers all. 
" Back, Lartius ! back, Herminius ! 

Back, ere the ruin fall ! " 450 

54 

Back darted Spurius Lartius ; 

Herminius darted back : 
And, as they passed, beneath their feet 

They felt the timbers crack. 
But when they turned their faces, 455 

And on the farther shore 
Saw brave Horatius stand alone, 

They would have crossed once more. 

55 

But with a crash like thunder 

Fell every loosened beam, 460 

And, like a dam, the mighty wreck 

Lay right athwart the stream ; 
And a long shout of triumph 

Rose from the walls of Rome, 



28 LORD MA CAUL AY 

As to the highest turret-tops 465 

Was splashed the yellow foam. 

56 

And, like a horse unbroken 

When first he feels the rein, 
The furious river struggled hard, 

And tossed his tawny mane, 470 

And burst the curb, and bounded, 

Rejoicing to be free, 
And whirling down, in fierce career, 
Battlement, and plank, and pier, 

Rushed headlong to the sea. 475 

57 

Alone stood brave Horatius, 
But constant still in mind ; 
Thrice thirty thousand foes before, 
And the broad flood behind. 
" Down with him ! " cried false Sextus, 480 

With a smile on his pale face. 
" Now yield thee," cried Lars Porsena, 
Now yield thee to our grace." 



u 



58 

Round turned he, as not deigning 

Those craven ranks to see ; 485 

Naught spake he to Lars Porsena, 
To Sextus naught spake he ; 

But he saw on Palatinus 1 

The white porch of his home ; 

1 Mons Palatinus survives in the Palatine hill of modern 
Rome. It was the hill on which Romulus founded the city of 
Rome. 



HORATIUS 29 

And he spake to the noble river 490 

That rolls by the towers of Rome. 

59 

" O Tiber ! father Tiber ! 

To whom the Romans pray, 
A Roman's life, a Roman's arms, 

Take thou in charge this day ! " 495 

So he spake, and speaking sheathed 

The good sword by his side, 
And with his harness on his back 

Plunged headlong in the tide. 

60 

No sound of joy or sorrow 500 

Was heard from either bank ; 
But friends and foes in dumb surprise, 
With parted lips and straining eyes, 

Stood gazing where he sank : 
And when above the surges 505 

They saw his crest appear, 
All Rome sent forth a rapturous cry, 
And even the ranks of Tuscany 

Could scarce forbear to cheer. 

61 

But fiercely ran the current, 510 

Swollen high by months of rain : 
And fast his blood was flowing, 

And he was sore in pain, 
And heavy with his armor, 

And spent with changing blows : 515 

And oft they thought him sinking, 

But still again he rose. 



30 LORD MACAULAY 

62 

Never, I ween, did swimmer, 

In such an evil ease, 
Struggle through such a raging flood 520 

Safe to the landing-place : 
But his limbs were borne up bravely 

By the brave heart within, 
And our good father Tiber 

Bore bravely up his chin. 525 

63 

" Curse on him ! " quoth false Sextus ; 
" Will not the villain drown ? 
But for this stay, ere close of day 
We should have sacked the town ! " 
" Heaven help him ! " quoth Lars Porsena, 530 
" And bring him safe to shore ; 
For such a gallant feat of arms 
Was never seen before." 

64 

And now he feels the bottom ; 

Now on dry earth he stands ; 535 

Now round him throng the Fathers 

To press his gory hands ; 
And now, with shouts and clapping, 

And noise of weeping loud, 
He enters through the River-Gate, 540 

Borne by the joyous crowd. 

65 

They gave him of the corn-land. 
That was of public rig]it ? 



HORATIUS 31 

As much as two strong oxen 

Could plough from morn till night ; 545 

And they made a molten image, 

And set it up on high, 
And there it stands unto this day 

To witness if I lie. 

66 

It stands in the Comitium, 1 550 

Plain for all folk to see ; 
Horatius in his harness, 

Halting upon one knee : 
And underneath is written, 

In letters all of gold, 555 

How valiantly he kept the bridge 

In the brave days of old. 

67 * 

And still his name sounds stirring 

Unto the men of Rome, 
As the trumpet-blast that cries to them 560 

To charge the Volscian home ; 
And wives still pray to Juno 

For boys with hearts as bold 
As his who kept the bridge so well 

In the brave days of old. 565 

68 

And in the nights of winter, 

When the cold north-winds blow, 

And the long howling of the wolves 
Is heard amidst the snow ; 

1 The Comitium was that part of the Forum which served as 
the meeting-place of the Roman patricians. 



32 LORD MA CAUL AY 

When round the lonely cottage 570 

Roars loud the tempest's din, 
And the good logs of Algidus * 

Roar louder yet within ; 

69 

When the oldest cask is opened, 

And the largest lamp is lit ; 575 

When the chestnuts glow in the embers, 

And the kid turns on the spit ; 
When young and old in circle 

Around the firebrands close ; 
When the girls are weaving baskets, 580 

And the lads are shaping bows ; 

70 

When the goodman mends his armor, 

And trims his helmet's plume ; 
When the goodwife's shuttle merrily 

Goes flashing through the loom, 585 

With weeping and with laughter 

Still is the story told, 
How well Horatius kept the bridge 

In the brave days of old. 

1 The Romans brought some of their firewood from the hill 
of Algidus, about a dozen miles to the southeast of the town. 




JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 

From the crayon by S. W. Rouse in the possession of Professor Charles Eliot Norton 



THE SINGING LEAVES 

A BALLAD i 
JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 



" What fairings will ye that I bring ? " 
Said the King to his daughters three ; 

" For I to Vanity Fair 2 am boun, 
Now say what shall they be ? " 

Then up and spake the eldest daughter, 5 

That lady tall and grand : 

1 It is interesting to note the following characteristics of the 
old ballad which Lowell has captured in this poem of 1854. 
The setting is, properly, a time and place in which wonders 
happen as matters of course ; the characters are all^ wonder- 
people, — a king, princesses, and a page possessed of the magic 
power of song. Nature, in the trees and the Singing Leaves, is 
endowed with a human personality. The plot of the ballad is, 
as of old it always was, a single incident, — a simple conflict be- 
tween the two main characters. Lowell has also kept the ballad 
form in the four-line stanzas with the second and fourth lines 
rhyming ; in the free use of epithets ; in the repetition of words 
and phrases ; and in the use of archaic forms such as fairings, 
but and, shoon, etc. 

2 The name of a fair held all the year round in the town of 
Vanity in Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. " It beareth the name 
because the town where it is kept is lighter than vanity, and also 
because all that is there sold, or that cometh thither, is vanity." 
The town lay on the way to the Celestial City, and the passing 
through it was one of Pilgrim's temptations. 



34 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 



u 



Oh, bring me pearls and diamonds great, 
And gold rings for my hand." 



Thereafter spake the second daughter, 

That was both white and red : 10 

" For me bring silks that will stand alone, 
And a gold comb for my head." 

Then came the turn of the least daughter, 
That was whiter than thistle-down, 

And among the gold of her blithesome hair 15 
Dim shone the golden crown. 

" There came a bird this morning, 
And sang 'neath my bower eaves, 
Till I dreamed, as his music made me, 

'Ask thou for the Singing Leaves.' ' 20 

Then the brow of the King swelled crimson 
With a flush of angry scorn : 
" Well have ye spoken, my two eldest, 
And chosen as ye were born ; 

" But she, like a thing of peasant race, 25 

That is happy binding the sheaves ; " 
Then he saw her dead mother in her face, 
And said, " Thou shalt have thy leaves." 

/ ii 

He mounted and rode three days and nights 
Till he came to Vanity Fair, 30 

And 't was easy to buy the gems and the silk, 
But no Singing Leaves were there. 



\ 



THE SINGING LEAVES 35 

Then deep in the greenwood rode he, 
And asked of every tree, 
" Oh, if you have ever a Singing Leaf, 35 

I pray you give it me ! " 

But the trees all kept their counsel, 

And never a word said they, 
Only there sighed from the pine-tops 

A music of seas far away. 40 

Only the pattering aspen 

Made a sound of growing rain, 
That fell ever faster and faster, 

Then faltered to silence again. 

" Oh, where shall I find a little foot-page 45 

That would win both hose and shoon, 
And will bring to me the Singing Leaves 
If they grow under the moon ? " 

Then lightly turned him Walter the page, 

By the stirrup as he ran : 50 

" Now pledge you me the truesome word 
Of a king and gentleman, 



u 



That you will give me the first, first thing 

You meet at your castle-gate, 
And the Princess shall get the Singing Leaves, 55 

Or mine be a traitor's fate." 

The King's head dropt upon his breast 

A moment, as it might be ; 
'T will be my dog, he thought, and said, 

" My faith I plight to thee." 60 



36 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 

Then Walter took from next bis heart 
A packet small and thin, 
" Now give you this to the Princess Anne, 
The Singing Leaves are therein." 



in 

As the King rode in at his castle-gate, 65 

A maiden to meet him ran, 
And " Welcome, father ! " she laughed and cried 

Together, the Princess Anne. 

" Lo, here the Singing Leaves," quoth he, 

" And woe, but they cost me dear ! " 70 

She took the packet, and the smile 
Deepened down beneath the tear. 

It deepened down till it reached her heart, 

And then gushed up again, 
And lighted her tears as the sudden sun 75 

Transfigures the summer rain. 

And the first Leaf, when it was opened, 

Sang : "lam Walter the page, 
And the songs I sing 'neath thy window 

Are my only heritage." 80 

And the second Leaf sang : " But in the land 
That is neither on earth nor sea, 
• My lute and I are lords of more 
Than thrice this kingdom's fee." 

And the third Leaf sang, " Be mine ! Be mine ! " 85 
And ever it sang, " Be mine ! " 



THE SINGING LEAVES 37 

Then sweeter it sang and ever sweeter, 
And said, " I am thine, thine, thine ! " 

At the first Leaf she grew pale enough, 

At the second she turned aside, 90 

At the third, 't was as if a lily flushed 
With a rose's red heart's tide. 

" Good counsel gave the bird," said she, 
" I have my hope thrice o'er, 
For they sing to my very heart," she said, 95 

" And it sings to them evermore." 

She brought to him her beauty and truth, 

But and l broad earldoms three, 
And he made her queen of the broader lands 

He held of his lute in fee. 100 

1 But and, archaic form for and also. Cf. from an old 

ballad: — 

" And they hae chased in gude green-wood 
The buck but and the roe." 



EHGECUS x 

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 

God sends his teachers unto every age, 
To every clime, and every race of men, 
With revelations fitted to their growth 
And shape of mind, nor gives the realm of Truth 
Into the selfish rule of one sole race : 5 

Therefore each form of worship that hath swayed 
The life of man, and given it to grasp 
The master-key of knowledge, reverence, 
Infolds some germs of goodness and of right; 
Else never had the eager soul, which loathes 10 
The slothful down of pampered ignorance, 
Found in it even a moment's fitful rest. 

1 This early poem (1843) presents most convincingly a dis- 
tinguishing characteristic of Lowell's verse. The poet's inspira- 
tion here is one of those myths of long ago which never failed 
to charm him ; and he adds his own personality to that myth in 
the tone of moral earnestness in which he voices his theme. His 
own criticism of his poetry was, — 

" The top of the hill he will ne'er come nigh reaching, 
Till he learns the distinction twixt singing and preaching." 

Accordingly, we find here, not the language of great poetic pas- 
sion, but the calm academic elegance of expression which, while 
it fetters the muse, gives a stately freedom to the moral dignity 
of the legend. Landor used the same theme in his poem, " The 
Hamadryad," working, as Stedman says, " as a Grecian might, 
giving the tale in chiselled verse, with no curious regard for its 
teachings." But the New England conscience speaks in Lowell's 
Rhoecus; and in his hands the myth becomes an allegory whose 
simple lesson is, " Only the soul hath power o'er itself." 



RHCECUS 39 

There is an instinct in the human heart 
Which makes that all the fables it hath coined, 
To justify the reign of its belief 15 

And strengthen it by beauty's right divine, 
Veil in their inner cells a mystic gift, 
Which, like the hazel twig, 1 in faithful hands, 
Points surely to the hidden springs of truth. 
For, as in nature naught is made in vain, 20 

But all things have within their hull of use 
A wisdom and a meaning which may speak 
Of spiritual secrets to the ear 
Of spirit ; so, in whatsoe'er the heart 
Hath fashioned for a solace to itself, 25 

To make its inspirations suit its creed, 
And from the niggard hands of falsehood wring 
Its needful food of truth, there ever is 
A sympathy with Nature, which reveals, 
Not less than her own works, pure gleams of light 
And earnest parables of inward lore. 31 

Hear now this fairy legend of old Greece, 
As full of gracious youth and beauty still 
As the immortal freshness of that grace 
Carved for all ages on some Attic frieze. 2 35 

A youth named Ehoecus, wandering in the wood, 
Saw an old oak just trembling to its fall, 
And, feeling pity of so fair a tree, 
He propped its gray trunk with admiring care, 
And with a thoughtless footstep loitered on. 40 

1 Hazel twig, a forked hazel twig held in the hand was sup- 
posed to bend downward when carried over a place where ore or 
water could be found. 

2 Attic frieze, such as the frieze of the Parthenon with its won- 
derful figures. 



40 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 

But, as he turned, he heard a voice behind 

That murmured " Rhoecus ! " 'T was as if the leaves, 

Stirred by a passing breath, had murmured it, 

And, while he paused bewildered, yet again 

It murmured " Rhoecus ! " softer than a breeze. 45 

He started and beheld with dizzy eyes 

What seemed the substance of a happy dream 

Stand there before him, spreading a warm glow 

Within the green glooms of the shadowy oak. 

It seemed a woman's shape, yet far too fair 50 

To be a woman, and with eyes too meek 

For any that were wont to mate with gods. 

All naked like a goddess stood she there, 

And like a goddess all too beautiful 

To feel the guilt-born earthliness of shame. 55 

" Rhoecus, I am the Dryad * of this tree," 
Thus she began, dropping her low-toned words 
Serene, and full, and clear, as drops of dew, 

" And with it I am doomed to live and die ; 
The rain and sunshine are my caterers, 60 

Nor have I other bliss than simple life ; 
Now ask me what thou wilt, that I can give, 
And with a thankful joy it shall be thine." 

Then Rhoecus, with a flutter at the heart, 
Yet, by the prompting of such beauty, bold, 65 

Answered : " What is there that can satisfy 
The endless craving of the soul but love ? 
Give me thy love, or but the hope of that 
Which must be evermore my nature's goal." 
After a little pause she said again, 70 

But with a glimpse of sadness in her tone, 

" I give it, Rhoecus, though a perilous gift ; 

1 Dryad, the wood nymph whose life was bound up in the tree. 



RHCECUS 41 

An hour before the sunset meet me here." 

And straightway there was nothing he could see 

But the green glooms beneath the shadowy oak, 75 

And not a sound came to his straining ears 

But the low trickling rustle of the leaves, 

And far away upon an emerald slope 

The falter of an idle shepherd's pipe. 

Now, in those days of simpleness and faith, 80 
Men did not think that happy things were dreams 
Because they overstepped the narrow bourn 
Of likelihood, but reverently deemed 
Nothing too wondrous or too beautiful 
To be the guerdon of a daring heart. 85 

So Rhcecus made no doubt that he was blest, 
And all along unto the city's gate 
Earth seemed to spring beneath him as he walked, 
The clear, broad sky looked bluer than its wont, 
And he could scarce believe he had not wings, 90 
Such sunshine seemed to glitter through his veins 
Instead of blood, so light he felt and strange. 

Young Rhcecus had a faithful heart enough, 
But one that in the present dwelt too much, 
And, taking with blithe welcome whatsoe'er 95 

Chance gave of joy, was wholly bound in that, 
Like the contented peasant of a vale, 
Deemed it the world, and never looked beyond. 
So, haply meeting in the afternoon 
Some comrades who were playing at the dice, 100 
He joined them, and forgot all else beside. 

The dice were rattling at the merriest, 
And Rhcecus, who had met but sorry luck, 



42 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 

Just laughed in triumph at a happy throw, 104 

When through the room there hummed a yellow bee 
That buzzed about his ear with down-dropped legs 
As if to light. And Rhoecus laughed and said, 
Feeling how red and flushed he was with loss, 
" By Venus ! does he take me for a rose ? " 
And brushed him off with rough, impatient hand. 
But still the bee came back, and thrice again 111 
Rhoecus did beat him off with growing wrath. 
Then through the window flew the wounded bee, 
And Rhoecus, tracking him with angry eyes, 
Saw a sharp mountain-peak of Thessaly 115 

Against the red disk of the setting sun, — 
And instantly the blood sank from his heart, 
As if its very walls had caved away. 
Without a word he turned, and, rushing forth, 
Ran madly through the city and the gate, 120 

And o'er the plain, which now the wood's long shade, 
By the low sun thrown forward broad and dim, 
Darkened wellnigh unto the city's wall. 

Quite spent and out of breath he reached the tree, 
And, listening fearfully, he heard once more 125 
The low voice murmur " Rhoecus ! " close at hand : 
Whereat he looked around hiei, but could see 
Naught but the deepening glooms beneath the oak. 
Then sighed the voice, " O Rhoecus ! nevermore 
Shalt thou behold me or by day or night, 130 

Me, who would fain have blessed thee with a love 
More ripe and bounteous than ever yet 
Filled up with nectar any mortal heart : 
But thou didst scorn my humble messenger, 
And sent'st him back to me with bruised wings. 135 
We spirits only show to gentle eyes, 



RHCECUS 43 

We ever ask an undivided love, 
And he who scorns the least of Nature's works 
Is thenceforth exiled and shut out from all. 
Farewell ! for thou canst never see me more." 140 

Then Rhcecus beat his breast, and groaned aloud, 
And cried, " Be pitiful ! forgive me yet 
This once, and I shall never need it more ! " 
" Alas ! " the voice returned, " 't is thou art blind, 
Not I unmerciful ; I can forgive, 145 

But have no skill to heal thy spirit's eyes ; 
Only the soul hath power o'er itself." 
With that again there murmured " Nevermore ! " 
And Ehcecus after heard no other sound, 
Except the rattling of the oak's crisp leaves, 150 
Like the long surf upon a distant shore, 
Raking the sea-worn pebbles up and down. 
The night had gathered round him : o'er the plain 
The city sparkled with its thousand lights, 
And sounds of revel fell upon his ear 155 

Harshly and like a curse ; above, the sky, 
With all its bright sublimity of stars, 
Deepened, and on his forehead smote the breeze : 
Beauty was all around him and delight, 
But from that eve he was alone on earth. 160 



UNDEK THE OLD ELM 1 

Section upon Washington 

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 

Soldier and statesman, rarest unison ; 
High-poised example of great duties done 

1 Near Cambridge Common stands an old elm, having at its 
base a stone with the inscription, " Under this tree Washington 
first took command of the American Army, July 3d, 1115" 
Upon the one hundredth anniversary of this day the citizens of 
Cambridge held a celebration under the tree, and Mr. Lowell 
read the ode from which these stanzas are quoted. It is one 
of a trilogy of heroic odes written for three occasions that can 
never again offer so great inspiration to a poet. The first ode 
was that read at Concord on the hundredth anniversary of the 
fight at Concord bridge ; the second was Under the Old Elm, 
read at Cambridge on the one hundredth anniversary of Wash- 
ington's taking command of the American army ; the third was 
the Ode for the Fourth of July, read on the centennial of the 
Declaration of Independence. Stedman remarks, " Underwood 
has called the three odes an Alpine group, — yet each in its length 
and unevenness brings to mind a Rocky Mountain chain in which 
snowclad, sunlit peaks arise, connected by vaguely outlined 
ridges of the Sierra." One of these peaks is, surely, this sec- 
tion upon Washington. Lowell writes to a friend, " We, too, 
here in my birthplace, having found out that something hap- 
pened here a hundred years ago, must have our centennial ; and 
since my friend and townsman Dr. Holmes could n't be had, I 
felt bound to do all the poetry for the day. We have still stand- 
ing the elm under which Washington took command of the 
American army, and under which also Whitefield had preached 
some thirty years before." The stanzas here selected comprise 
the whole of the famous eulogy upon Washington. 




GEORGE WASHINGTON 

{From the Trumbull portrait at Yale College) 



UNDER THE OLD ELM 45 

Simply as breathing, a world's honors worn 

As life's indifferent gifts to all men born ; 

Dumb for himself, unless it were to God, 5 

But for his barefoot soldiers eloquent, 

Tramping the snow to coral * where they trod, 

Held by his awe in hollow-eyed content ; 

Modest, yet firm as Nature's self ; unblamed 

Save by the men his nobler temper shamed ; 10 

Never seduced through show of present good 

By other than un setting lights to steer 

New-trimmed in Heaven, nor than his steadfast 

mood 
More steadfast, far from rashness as from fear ; 
Rigid, but with himself first, grasping still 15 

In swerveless poise the wave-beat helm of will : 
Not honored then or now because he wooed 
The popular voice, but that he still withstood ; 
Broad-minded, higher-souled, there is but one 
Who was all this and ours, and all men's, — Wash- 
ington. 20 

Minds strong by fits, irregularly great, 
That flash and darken like revolving lights, 
Catch more the vulgar eye unschooled to wait 
On the long curve of patient days and nights 
Rounding a whole life to the circle fair 25 

Of orbed fulfilment ; and this balanced soul, 
So simple in its grandeur, coldly bare 
Of draperies theatric, standing there 
In perfect symmetry of self-control, 
Seems not so great at first, but greater grows 30 

Still as we look, and by experience learn 
How grand this quiet is, how nobly stern 
1 At Valley Forge. 



46 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 

The discipline that wrought through life-long throes 
That energetic passion of repose. 

A nature too decorous * and severe, 35 

Too self -respectful in its griefs and joys, 

For ardent girls and boys 

Who find no genius in a mind so clear 

That its grave depths seem obvious and near, 

Nor a soul great that made so little noise. 40 

They feel no force in that calm-cadenced phrase, 

The habitual full-dress of his well-bred mind, 

That seems to pace the minuet's courtly maze 

And tell of ampler leisures, roomier length of days. 

His firm-based brain, to self so little kind 45 

That no tumultuary blood could blind, 

Formed to control men, not to amaze, 

Looms not like those that borrow height of haze : 

It was a world of statelier movement then 

Than this we fret in, he a denizen 50 

Of that ideal Rome that made a man for men. 



The longer on this earth we live 

And weigh the various qualities of men, 

Seeing how most are fugitive, 

Or fitful gifts, at best, of now and then, 55 

Wind-wavered corpse-lights, daughters of the fen, 2 

1 The rhythm shows the pronunciation to be deco'rous. The 
poets vary in their usage. An analogous word is sonorous. 
Decorum always has the accent on the second syllable. 

2 The daughters of the fen, — will-o'-the-wisps. The Welsh 
call the same phenomenon corpse-lights, because it was supposed 
to forebode death, and to show the road that the corpse would 
take. 



UNDER THE OLD ELM 47 

The more we feel the high stern-featured beauty 

Of plain devotedness to duty, 

Steadfast and still, nor paid with mortal praise, 

But finding amplest recompense 60 

For life's ungarlanded expense 

In work done squarely and unwasted days. 

For this we honor him, that he could know 

How sweet the service and how free 

Of her, God's eldest daughter here below, 65 

And choose in meanest raiment which was she. 

Placid completeness, life without a fall 

From faith or highest aims, truth's breachless wall, 

Nor ever faltered 'neath the load 

Of petty cares, that gall great hearts the most, 70 

But kept right on the strenuous up-hill road, 

Strong to the end, above complaint or boast : 

The popular tempest on his rock-mailed coast 

Wasted its wind-borne spray, 

The noisy marvel of a day ; 75 

His soul sate still in its unstormed abode. 



Virginia gave us this imperial man 

Cast in the massive mould 

Of those high-statured ages old 

Which into grander forms our mortal metal ran ; 80 

She gave us this unblemished gentleman : 

What shall we give her back but love and praise 

As in the dear old unestranged days 

Before the inevitable wrong began ? 

Mother of States and undiminished men, 85 

Thou gavest us a country, giving him, 



48 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 

And we owe alway what we owed thee then : 

The boon thou wouldst have snatched from us 

again 
Shines as before with no abatement dim. 
A great man's memory is the only thing 90 

With influence to outlast the present whim 
And bind us as when here he knit our golden ring. 
All of him that was subject to the hours 
Lies in thy soil and makes it part of ours : 
Across more recent graves, 95 

Where unresentful Nature waves 
Her pennons o'er the shot-ploughed sod, 
Proclaiming the sweet Truce of God, 1 
We from this consecrated plain stretch out 
Our hands as free from afterthought or doubt 100 
As here the united North 
Poured her embrowned manhood forth 
In welcome of our saviour and thy son. 
Through battle we have better learned thy worth, 
The long-breathed valor and undaunted will, 105 

Which, like his own, the day's disaster done, 
Could, safe in manhood, suffer and be still. 
Both thine and ours the victory hardly won ; 
If ever with distempered voice or pen 
We have misdeemed thee, here we take it back, 110 
And for the dead of both don common black. 

1 The name is drawn from a compact in 1640 when the Church 
forbade the barons to make any attack on their fellows between 
sunset on Wednesday and sunrise on the following Monday, or 
upon any ecclesiastical fast or feast day. It also provided that 
no man was to molest a laborer working in the fields, or to lay 
hands on any implement of husbandry, on pain of excommuni- 
cation. 



UNDER THE OLD ELM 49 

Be to us evermore as thou wast then, 

As we forget thou hast not always been, 

Mother of States and unpolluted men, 

Virginia, fitly named from England's manly queen ! 115 



UNDER THE WILLOWS * 

Selection 

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 

Frank-hearted hostess of the field and wood, 

Gypsy, whose roof is every spreading tree, 

June is the pearl of our New England year. 

Still a surprisal, though expected long, 

Her coming startles. Long she lies in wait, 5 

Makes many a feint, peeps forth, draws coyly back, 

Then, from some southern ambush in the sky, 

With one great gush of blossom storms the world. 

A week ago the sparrow was divine ; 

The bluebird, shifting his light load of song 10 

From post to post along the cheerless fence, 

Was as a rhymer ere the poet come ; 

But now, oh rapture ! sunshine winged and voiced, 

1 (i The Willows was a clump of trees not far from Elm wood. 
Lowell took a peculiar pleasure in their gnarled and umbrageous 
forms, and wrote to Fields while the volume which took its title 
from the trees was in press : * My heart was almost broken 
yesterday by seeing nailed to my willow a board with these words 
on it, " These trees for sale." The wretch is going to peddle them 
for firewood ! If I had the money, I would buy the piece of ground 
they stand on to save them, — the dear friends of a lifetime. 
They would be a loss to the town. But what can we do ? They 
belong to a man who values them by the cord. I wish Fenn 
had sketched them at least. One of them I hope will stand a few 
years yet in my poem, — but he might just as well have out- 
lasted me and my works, making his own green ode every 
summer.' " — LowelVs Poems, Cambridge Edition. 



UNDER THE WILLOWS 51 

Pipe blown through by the warm wild breath of the 

West 
Shepherding his soft droves of fleecy cloud, 15 

Gladness of woods, skies, waters, all in one, 
The bobolink l has come, and, like the soul 
Of the sweet season vocal in a bird, 
Gurgles in ecstasy we know not what 
Save June 1 Dear June 1 Now God be praised for 

June. 20 

May is a pious fraud of the almanac, 

A ghastly parody of real Spring 

Shaped out of snow and breathed with eastern wind ; 

Or if, o'er-confident, she trust the date, 

And, with her handful of anemones, 25 

Herself as shivery, steal into the sun, 

The season need but turn his hour-glass round, 

And winter suddenly, like crazy Lear, 2 

Reels back, and brings the dead May in his arms, 

Her budding breasts and wan dislustred front 30 

With frosty streaks and drifts of his white beard 

All overblown. Then, warmly walled with books, 

While my wood-fire supplies the sun's defect, 

Whispering old forest-sagas in its dreams, 

1 Bryant has a charming poem, Robert of Lincoln, in which the 
light-hearted song of the bird gets a homelier but no less de- 
lightful interpretation. See, also, Lowell's lines in Suthin' in the 
Pastoral Line, No. VI. of the second series of The Biglow 
Papers : — 

" 'Nuff sed, June's bridesman, poet o' the year, 
Gladness on wings, the bobolink is here ; 
Half-hid in tip-top apple-blooms he swings, 
Or climbs against the breeze with quiverin' wings, 
Or, givin' way to 't in a mock despair, 
Runs down, a brook o' laughter, thru the air." 

2 In the fifth act of Shakespeare's King Lear, Lear enters with 
Cordelia dead in his arms. 



52 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 

I take my May down from the happy shelf 35 

Where perch the world's rare song-birds in a row, 
Waiting my choice to open with full breast, 
And beg an alms of spring-time, ne'er denied 
In-doors by vernal Chancer, 1 whose fresh woods 
Throb thick with merle and mavis all the year. 40 

July breathes hot, sallows the crispy fields, 
Curls up the wan leaves of the lilac-hedge, 
And every eve cheats us with show of clouds 
That braze the horizon's western rim, or hang 
Motionless, with heaped canvas drooping idly, 45 

Like a dim fleet by starving men besieged, 
Conjectured half, and half descried afar, 
Helpless of wind, and seeming to slip back 
Adown the smooth curve of the oily sea. 

But June is full of invitations sweet, 50 

Forth from the chimney's yawn and thrice-read tomes 2 
To leisurely delights and sauntering thoughts 
That brook no ceiling narrower than the blue. 
The cherry, drest for bridal, at my pane 
Brushes, then listens, Will he come ? The bee, 55 

1 Chaucer, cf . Longfellow's tribute to Chaucer : — 

" He is the poet of the dawn, who wrote 
The Canterbury Tales, and his old age 
Made beautiful with song ; and, as I read 
I hear the crowing cock, I hear the note 
Of lark and linnet, and from every page 
Rise odors of ploughed field or flowery mead." 

2 Cf . Chaucer's lines : — 

11 And as for me, though that I kon but lytee, 
On bokes for to rede I me delyte, 



Save, certeynely, when that the moneth of May 
Is comen, and that I here the foules synge, 
And that the floures gynnen for to sprynge, 
Farewell my boke and my devocioun ! " 
4 



UNDER THE WILLOWS 53 

All dusty as a miller, takes his toll 

Of powdery gold, and grumbles. What a day 

To sun me and do nothing ! Nay, I think 

Merely to bask and ripen is sometimes 

The student's wiser business ; the brain 60 

That forages all climes to line its cells, 

Ranging both worlds on lightest wings of wish, 

Will not distil the juices it has sucked 

To the sweet substance of pellucid thought, 

Except for him who hath the secret learned 65 

To mix his blood with sunshine, and to take 

The winds into his pulses. Hush ! 't is he ! 

My oriole, my glance of summer fire, 

Is come at last, and, ever on the watch, 

Twitches the pack-thread I had lightly wound 70 

About the bough to help his housekeeping, — 

Twitches and scouts by turns, blessing his luck, 

Yet fearing me who laid it in his way, 

Nor, more than wiser we in our affairs, 

Divines the providence that hides and helps, 75 

Heave, ho ! Heave, oh ! he whistles as the twine 

Slackens its hold ; once more, now ! and a flash 

Lightens across the sunlight to the elm 

Where his mate dangles at her cup of felt. 

Nor all his booty is the thread ; he trails 80 

My loosened thought with it along the air, 

And I must follow, would I ever find 

The inward rhyme to all this wealth of life. 



INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP 1 

ROBERT BROWNING 

You know, we French stormed Ratisbon : 

A mile or so away, 
On a little mound, Napoleon 

Stood on our storming-day ; 
With neck out-thrust, you fancy how, 5 

Legs wide, arms locked behind, 
As if to balance the prone brow 

Oppressive with its mind. 

Just as perhaps he mused " My plans 

That soar, to earth may fall, 10 

1 Although the background of this poem is the whole history 
of Napoleon's fifth war with Austria in general, or the battle of 
Regensburg (Ratisbon) in particular, Browning's interest is to 
choose for his theme the one dramatic moment in the life of a 
boy-soldier in the ranks. Browning's theory of poetry was that 
its province is human life and action, and its theme any intense, 
dramatic, personal act whether of the great or the humble. 

" Take the least man of all mankind, as I, 
Look at his head and heart, find how and why 
He differs from his fellows utterly," 

he says, and there the poet has his material. The theme of all 
his short dramatic poems is such a disclosure of a man's soul in 
a second. So here the whole of Napoleon's ambition flashes out 
in two lines, the boy's devotion in a single stanza, and his sacri- 
fice in three words. The Browning note of realism is evident in 
the description of Napoleon; and that optimism which marked 
him from contemporary poets speaks bravely in the boy's spirit- 
ual victory, completely won, though at a dear cost. So this vivid 
dramatic bit in its material, theme, and rapid treatment is a fair 
type of the art of Browning's short poems. 



INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP 55 

Let once my army-leader Lannes 

Waver at yonder wall," — 
Out 'twixt the battery-smokes there flew 

A rider, bound on bound 
Full-galloping ; nor bridle drew 15 

Until he reached the mound. 

Then off there flung in smiling joy, 

And held himself erect 
By just his horse's mane, a boy : 

You hardly could suspect — 20 

(So tight he kept his lips compressed, 

Scarce any blood came through) 
You looked twice ere you saw his breast 

Was all but shot in two. 

" Well," cried he, " Emperor, by God's grace 25 

We 've got you Ratisbon ! 
The Marshal 's in the market-place, 

And you '11 be there anon 
To see your flag-bird flap his vans 

Where I, to heart's desire, 30 

Perched him ! " The chief's eye flashed ; his plans 

Soared up again like fire. 

The chief's eye flashed ; but presently 

Softened itself, as sheathes 
A film the mother-eagle's eye 35 

When her bruised eaglet breathes ; 
"You're wounded ! " "Nay," the soldier's pride, 

Touched to the quick, he said : 
" I 'm killed, Sire ! " And his chief beside, 

Smiling the boy fell dead. 40 



THE OCEAN 1 

LORD BYRON 

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods ; 
There is a rapture on the lonely shore ; 
There is society where none intrudes, 
By the deep sea, and music in its roar : 
I love not man the less, but nature more, 5 

From these our interviews, in which I steal 
From all I may be, or have been before, 
To mingle with the universe, and feel 
What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal. 

1 From Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, Canto IV, stanzas clxxviii- 
clxxxiv. Bryon's verse is a good example of poetry condi- 
tioned entirely by the temperament of the poet. Throughout 
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage the writer poses as one who has " not 
loved the world, nor the world him ; " and his deliberate aloof- 
ness from life and its problems and conventions carried him into 
an atmosphere purely romantic. If he ever took notice of life 
at all, it was to rail at it from some vantage point of solitary 
communion with nature or the past. The selection here quoted 
shows exactly that attitude. The mood that rebels in this way 
against life and refuses to face its responsibilities never can give 
great poetry to the world ; but these stanzas do show that 
Byron's emotions are intense and his power to make us share 
them wonderful. It was after the publication of the first two 
cantos of this poem that Byron " woke one morning to find him- 
self famous." He once called himself " the grand Napoleon of 
the realms of rhyme ;" and modern criticism, which attacks 
Byron rather severely, condemns the spirit of the poet with 
such absorption that it forgets, perhaps at times, the brilliancy 
of his poetic style. 



THE OCEAN 57 

Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean, roll ! 10 
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain ; 
Man marks the earth with ruin ; his control 
Stops with the shore ; upon the watery plain 
The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain 
A shadow of man's ravage, save his own, 15 

When, for a moment, like a drop of rain, 
He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan, 
Without a grave, unknelled, uncoffined, and unknown. 

His steps are not upon thy paths ; thy fields 

Are not a spoil for him ; thou dost arise 20 

And shake him from thee; the vile strength he 

wields 
For earth's destruction thou dost all despise, 
Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies, 
And send'st him, shivering in thy playful spray, 
And howling, to his gods, where haply lies 25 

His petty hope in some near port or bay, 
And dashest him again to earth : there let him lay. 1 

The armaments which thunderstrike the walls 
Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake, 
And monarchs tremble in their capitals, 30 

The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make 
Their clay creator the vain title take 
Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war, — 

1 " This use of lay has caused considerable comment. Byron, 
whether carelessly or intentionally, employs lay several times in 
his poems as an intransitive verb. He might find authority for 
this confusion of lie and lay in writers of the middle English 
period; but it must be confessed that no great poet of the lan- 
guage is so careless of his grammar as Byron." — Byron's Poems, 
Cambridge Edition. 



58 LORD BYRON 

These are thy toys, and, as the snowy flake, 
They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar 35 
Alike the Armada's 1 pride or spoils of Trafalgar* 2 

Thy shores are empires, changed in all save thee : 
Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what are they? 
Thy waters washed them power while they were 

free, 
And many a tyrant since ; their shores obey 40 

The stranger, slave, or savage ; their decay 
Has dried up realms to deserts : not so thou, 
Unchangeable save to thy wild waves' play ; 
Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow ; 
Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now. 45 

Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty's form 
Glasses itself in tempests ; in all time, 
Calm or convulsed ; in breeze or gale or storm, 
Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime 
Dark-heaving, boundless, endless, and sublime, — 50 
The image of Eternity, the throne 
Of the Invisible ; even from out thy slime 
The monsters of the deep are made ; each zone 
Obeys thee ; thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, alone. 

And I have loved thee, Ocean ! and my joy 55 

Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be 
Borne, like thy bubbles, onward : from a boy 

1 wantoned with thy breakers — they to me 
Were a delight ; and if the freshening sea 

i Armada, the fleet of Philip II of Spain defeated by Sir 
Francis Drake. 

2 Trafalgar, the famous battle in which Lord Nelson de- 
feated Napoleon's navy. 



THE OCEAN 59 

Made them a terror — 't was a pleasing fear, 60 
For I was as it were a child of thee, 
And trusted to thy billows far and near, 
And laid thy hand upon thy mane, 1 — as I do here. 

1 Mane, cf . Scott's lines in The Lay of the Last Minstrel : — 

" Each wave was crested with tawny foam, 
Like the mane of a chestnut steed." 



TO A SKYLAKK 1 

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 

Hail to thee, blithe spirit ! 

Bird thou never wert, 
That from heaven, or near it, 

Pourest thy full heart 
In profuse strains of unpremeditated art. 5 

Higher still and higher, 

From the earth thou springest ; 

1 No more perfect type of the pure lyric can be found in all 
English literature than Shelley's Skylark. It has, to a degree 
that cannot be measured, the first requisite of lyric poetry, — 
the singing quality. One who yields to the spell of its music 
forgets that the words are written and that he reads ; he simply 
listens to a melody and a rhythm so spontaneous and ecstatic that 
he soars with the skylark, " higher still and higher." And this 
is the triumph of the lyric. Nothing more musical could be 
conceived than the fluttering, rippling rhythm of the unusual 
fifth lines in the stanzas. Secondly, the poem is purely subjec- 
tive ; it has no substance but the emotion of the poet, thus ful- 
filling the old law that a true lyric is the articulate cry of the 
poet's soul. The cry here, as in much of Shelley's poetry, is a 
sad one, making us believe indeed that " sweetest songs are those 
that tell of saddest thought." His exquisite appreciation of 
different aspects of nature is also preeminently a lyric quality. 
One of the wonders of the poem is the wealth of similes running 
through some ten stanzas, each coloring the poet's thought with 
a new tinge of meaning. That speaks the abandonment to mood 
out of which a lyric is born. Each stanza shows the delicate 
fairy touch that made Shelley the " Ariel of Songsters ; " and 
the passionate prayer of the last stanza seems to have been an- 
swered long e'er the poet uttered it. 



TO A SKYLARK 61 

Like a cloud of fire 

The blue deep thou wingest, 
And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest. 10 

In the golden lightning 

Of the sunken sun, 
O'er which clouds are brightening, 

Thou dost float and run ; 
Like an embodied joy whose race is just begun. 15 

The pale purple even 

Melts around thy flight ; 
Like a star of heaven, 

In the broad daylight 
Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight, 20 

Keen as are the arrows 
Of that silver sphere, 
Whose intense lamp narrows 
In the white dawn clear, 
Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there. 25 

All the earth and air 

With thy voice is loud ; 
As, when night is bare, 
From one lonely cloud 
The moon rains out her beams, and heaven is over- 
flowed. . 30 

What thou art we know not ; 

What is most like thee ? 
From rainbow clouds there flow not 

Drops so bright to see, 
As from thy presence showers a rain of melody — 35 



62 PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 

Like a poet hidden 

In the light of thought, 
Singing hymns unbidden, 

Till the world is wrought 
To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not : 40 

Like a high-born maiden 

In a palace tower, 
Soothing her love-laden 

Soul in secret hour 
With music sweet as love, which overflows her bower : 

Like a glowworm golden 46 

In a dell of dew, 
Scattering unbeholden 
Its aerial hue 
Among the flowers and grass, which screen it from the 
view : 50 

Like a rose embowered 

In its own green leaves, 
By warm winds deflowered, 
Till the scent it gives 
Makes faint with too much sweet these heavy-winged 
thieves. 55 

Sound of vernal showers 

On the twinkling grass, 
Rain-awakened flowers, 

All that ever was 
Joyous, and clear, and fresh, thy music doth surpass. 60 

Teach us, sprite or bird, 

What sweet thoughts are thine : 



TO A SKYLARK 63 

I have never heard 
Praise of love or wine 
That panted forth a flood of rapture so divine. 65 

Chorus hymeneal, 

Or triumphal chaunt, 
Matched with thine would be all 

But an empty vaunt — 
A thing wherein we feel there is some hidden want. 70 

What objects are the fountains 

Of thy happy strain ? 
What fields, or waves, or mountains ? 
What shapes of sky or plain ? 
What love of thine own kind? what ignorance of 
pain ? 75 

With thy clear keen joyance 

Languor cannot be : 
Shadow of annoyance 

Never came near thee : 
Thou lovest ; but ne'er knew love's sad satiety. 80 

Waking or asleep, 

Thou of death must deem 
Things more true and deep 

Than we mortals dream, 
Or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal stream ? 

We look before and after, 86 

And pine for what is not : 
Our sincerest laughter 

With some pain is fraught : 
Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest 

thought. 90 



64 PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 

Yet if we could scorn 

Hate, and pride, and fear ; 
If we were things born 
Not to shed a tear, 
I know not how thy joy we ever should come near. 95 

Better than all measures 

Of delightful sound, 
Better than all treasures 

That in books are found, 
Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the ground ! 100 

Teach me half the gladness 

That thy brain must know, 
Such harmonious madness 
From my lips would flow, 
The world should listen then, as I am listening now. 105 



THREE BOOKS ABOUT LITERATURE 



A STUDENT'S HISTORY OF 
ENGLISH LITERATURE 

BY 

WILLIAM E. SIMONDS, Ph. D. 

Professor of English Literature in Knox College, Galesburg, III, 
The book is divided into six chapters, as follows : — 

I. Anglo-Saxon Period ; II. Anglo-Norman Period ; III. 15th and 16th Centuries; 
IV. 17th Century; V. 1 8th Century ; VI. 19th Century. The illustrations include 
facsimiles of old manuscripts and title pages. 

Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25, net ; postpaid. 

A READER'S HISTORY OF 
AMERICAN LITERATURE 

BY 

THOMAS WENTWORTH HIGGINSON 

AND 

H. W. BOYNTON 

The book is divided into ten chapters, as follows : — 

I. The Puritan Writers; II. The Secular Writers; III. The Philadelphia Period; 
IV. The New York Period ; V. The New England Period — Preliminary ; VI. The 
Cambridge Group o VII. The Concord Group; VIII. The Southern Influence — 
Whitman ; IX. The Western Influence ; X. Forecast. 

An Appendix contains (1) A Glossary of Names — with a digest of life and work 
— of fifty-six authors ; (2) A Series of Reading Lists ; (3) A Chronological Table of 
important dates and events in American and English history and literature. The 
book contains facsimiles of manuscript and title pages. 

Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25, net, postpaid. 

A STUDY OF PROSE FICTION 

BY 

BLISS PERRY 

Editor of the A tlantic Monthly. Formerly Professor of English in 
Williams College and in Princeion University. 
The lLt of chapters is as follows : — 

I. The Study of Fiction; II. Prose Fiction as related to Poetry; III. Fiction and 
the Drama ; IV. Fiction and Science ; V. The Characters ; VI. The Plot ; VII. The 
Setting; VIII. The Fiction Writer; IX. Realism; X. Romanticism; XI. The 
Question of Form; XII. The Short Story; XIII. Present Tendencies of American 
Fiction. 

Appendix : Bibliographies.— Lists of Representative Novels. — Topics for Study. 
— Work in Construction. — Plot Analysis. — Review Questions. — Suggestion* 
for Study. 

Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25 net, postpaid. 

Descriptive circulars will be sent upon application. 

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Cfje iliucrsiDc literature &ztn$- continued 

74 Gray's Elegy, etc. ; Cowper's John Gilpin, etc. 

75 Scudder's George Washington.§ 

76. Wordsworth s On the Intimations of Immortality, and Other Poems. 
7 ;. Burns s Cotter s Saturday Night, and Other Poems.* 

78. Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield. § 

79. Lamb's Old China, and Other Essays of Elia. 

80. Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner, etc.; Campbell's Lochiel's 

Warning, etc * 

8i. Holmes's Autocrat of the "Breakfast- Table. §§ 

82. Hawthorne's Twice-Told Tales. §§§ 

83. George Eliot's Silas Marner.§ 

84. Dana's Two Years Before the Mast.§§§ 

85. Hughes's Tom Brown's School Days.§§ 

86. Scott's Ivanhoe.§§§ 

87. Defoe's Robinson Crusoe. §§§ 

88. Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin.§§§ 

-8q. Swift's Gulliver's Voyage to Lilliput.** 

90. Swift's Gulliver s Voyage to Brobdingnag.** 

91. Hawthorne's House of the Seven Gables. §§§ 

92 Burroughs's A Bunch of Herbs, and Other Papers. 

93. Shakespeare's As You Like It.*** 

94. Milton's Paradise Lost. Books I.-IIf.** 

95, 96, 97, 98. Cooper's Last of the Mohicans. In four parts. 

{The four parts also bound in one volume, linen, bo cents.) 
99. Tennyson's Coming of Arthur, and Other Idylls of the King. 

100. Burke's Conciliation with the Colonies. Robert Andersen, A. M : ' 

101. Homer's Iliad. Books I., VI., XXII., and XXIV, Pope.* 

102. Macaulay's Essays on Johnson and Goldsmith* 

103. Macaulay's Essay on Milton.*** 

104. Macaulay's Life and Writings of Addison.*** 

Nos. 102, 103, and 104 are edited by William P. Trent. 

105. Carlyle's Essay on Burns. George R. Noyes.* 

106. Shakespeare's Macbeth. Richard Grant White, and Helen Gray 

Cone* ** 
107,108. Grimm's Household Tales. Intwoparts.t 
109. Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. W. V. Moody.§ 
no. De Quincey's Flight of a Tartar Tribe. Milton Haight Turk.* 
hi. Tennyson ; s Princess. Rolfe. (Double Number, 30 cents. Also, in 

Rolfe's ±> indents' Series, cloth, to Teachers, 53 cents.) 

112. Virgil's iEneid. Books I. -II I. Translated by Cr a nch. 

113. Poems from the Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson. George H. 

Browne.** 

114. Old Greek Folk Stories. Josephine Preston Peabody.* 

115. Browning's Pied Piper of Hamelin, and Other Poems. 

116. Shakespeare's Hamlet. Richard Grant White and Helen Gray Cone.§ 

117. 118. Stories from the Arabian Nights. In two parts.! 

119. Poe's Raven, The Fall of the House of Usher, etc.** 

120. Poe's Gold-Bug, The Purloined Letter, and Other Tales.** 

Nos. 119, 120 are edited by William P. Trent. 

121. The Great Debate: Hayne's Speech.** 

122. The Great Debate: Webster's Reply to Hayne.** 

Nos. 121, 122 are edited by Lindsay Swift. 

123. Lowell's Democracy, and Other Papers.** 

124. Aldrich's Baby Bell, The Little Violinist, etc. 

125. Dryden's Palamon and Arcite. Arthur Gtlman.* 

126. Ruskin's King of the Golden River : Wonder Stories, by Others.* 

127. Keats's Ode on a Grecian Urn, The Eve of St. Agnes, etc. 

128. Byron's Prisoner of Chillon, and Other Poems. 

129. Plato's The Judgment of Socrates : being The Apology, Crito, and 

the Closing Scene of Phsedo. Translated by Paul E. Moke. 

130. Emerson's The Superlative, and Other Essays 

131. Emerson's Nature, and Compensation. Edited by Edward W. Emerson. 

132. Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum, etc. Louise Imogen Guiney.* 

133. Carl Schurz's Abraham Lincoln.** 

134- Scott's Lay of the Last Minstrel. Rolfe. (Double Number, 30 cents. 
Also in Rolfe" 1 's Students' Series, cloth, to Teachers, ^3 cents.) 

135* 136. Chaucer's Prologue, The Knight's Tale, and The Nun's Priest's 
Tale. [135] Introduction, and The Prologue. [136.] The Knight's Tale, 
and The Nun's Priest's Tale. Frank J. Mather, Jr.** 

For explanation ofsiens see end of list. 



€f)e fUtoergitie Stitcratur 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



137. 
138. 

139- 
140. 
141. 
142. 

143. 
144. 

H5- 
146. 
147. 
148. 
149. 
150. 

IS*- 
152. 

153. 
154. 
'55- 
156. 

157- 
158. 

160. 




013 979 156 3 



North's Translation. 



Homer's Iliad. Books I., VI , XXII., an 
Hawthorne's The Custom House, and 1 
Howells's Doorstep Acquaintance, and 
Thackeray's Henry Esmond. {Qutntup 
Three Outdoor Papers, by T. W Hig<;in 
Ruskin's Sesame and Lilies ; 1. Of Kii 

Gardens.* 
Plutarch s Life of Alexander the Great. 
Scudder's Book of Legends.* 
Hawthorne's Gentle Boy, and Other Tales. 
Longfellow s Giles Corey of the Salem Farms. 
Pope's Rape of the Lock, and Other Poems. Henry W. Boynton. 
Hawthorne's Marble Faun. Annie Russell Marble.§§§ 
Shakespeare's Twelfth Night. R. G. White and Helen Gray Cone * 
Ouida's A Dog of Flanders, and The Niirnberg Stove.* 
Mrs. Ewing's Jackanapes, and The Brownies.* H. W. Boynton. 
Martineau*s Peasant and Prince.§ H. W. Boynton. 
Shakespeare's Midsummer- Night's Dream. Laura E- I ockwood. 
Shakespeare's Tempest. R. G. White and E. E. Hale, Jr.* 
Irving's Life of Goldsmith. Willis Boughton.§§. 
Tennyson's Gareth and Lynette, Lancelot and Elaine, The Passing of 

Arthur.* 
The Song of Roland. Translated by Isabel Butler. § 
Merlin, and Sir Balin. Books I. and II. From Malory's King Arthur 

C G. Child* 
Beowulf. C. G. Child* 
Spenser's Faerie Queene. Book I.§ 



EXTRA NUMBERS 

4 American Authors and their Birthdays. By A. S. Roe. 
B Portraits and Biographies of 1 wenty American Authors. 
C A Longfellow Night." For Cathoiic Schools and Societies. 
D Literature in School. Essays by Horace E. Scudder. 

G Harriet Beecher Stowe. Dialogues and Scenes. 

F Longfellow Leaflets. \ 

G Whittier Leaflets. 1 Each a Double Number, 30 cents ; linen, 40 cents. 

H Holmes Leaflets. J Poems and Prose Passages for Reading and Recitation. 

O Lowell Leaflets J 

/ The Riverside Primary Reading Manual for Teachers. By I. F. Hall. 

K The Riverside Primer and Reader 25 cents: linen, 3c cents. 

L The Riverside Song Book. 120 Classic American Poems set to Standard 

Music. {Double Number, 30 cents ; boards, 40 cents.) 
M Lowell's Fable for Critics. {Double A/ umber, 30 cents.) 
N Selections from the Writings of Eleven American Authors. 
P The Hiawatha Primer. {Special Number.) A First Book in Reading. By 

Florence Hoi. brook. Cloth only, 40 cents. 
V The Book of Nature Myths. (Special Number.) A Second Book in Reading 

to follow the Hiawatha Primer. By Florence Holbrock. Cloth only, 

45 cents. 
Selections from the Writings of Eleven English Authors, 
j? Hawthorne's Selected Twice-Told Tales. N. Y. Regents' Requirements. 

Paper, 20 cents - , linen, 30 cents. 

5 Irving's Selected Essays from the Sketch Book. N Y. Regents' Require- 

ments. {Double Number, 30 cents; linen, 40 cents.) 
T Emerson's Nature , Lowell's My Garden Acquaintance. N. Y. Regents' 

Requirements. 
U A Dramatization of Longfellow's Song of Hiawatha. By Florence Hol- 

BROOK. 

W Brown's In the Days of Giants. Cloth onlv, 50 cents. 
X Poems for the Study ot Language. Illin- is Course. § 

Also, bound in linen: *25 cents. **4and 5, in one vol., 40 cents; likewise 6 and 
31, 11 and 63, 28 and 36, 29 and 10, 30 and 15, 32 and 133, 39 and 123, 40 and 69, 42 
and 113, 55 and 67, 57 and 58, 70 and 71, 72 and 94, 103 and 104, 119 and 120, 121 
and 122. % Also in one vol., 40 cents. XX 1, 4, and 30 also in one vol., 50 cents 
likewise j t 8, and q ; 28, 37, and 27 ; 33, 34, and 35 ; 64, 65, and 66. § Double Num- 
ber, paner, 30 cents ; linen, 40 cents. §§ Triple Number, paper, 45 cents ; linen, 50 
cents. §§§ Quadruple Number, paper, 50 cents; linen, 60 cents. 

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